Effects of emotional intelligence on inhibiting retaliation for ostracism in cyberball

Abstract

Emotional intelligence plays an important role in coordinating social interaction. This study investigated the effects of emotional intelligence on inhibiting retaliation for ostracism. Seventy-six university students (44 men and 32 women) played an online ball-tossing game called Cyberball (Williams, Cheung, & Choi, 2000) with three other players. In the first session, each participant and another player were either ostracized or included by the other two players. In the second session, the participant had to decide whether to ostracize the other two players, who were the ostracism offenders in the ostracism condition, by throwing back the ball to the other player or not. The results show that those who have high regulation of emotions in the self, one of the subscales of emotional intelligence, better inhibited retaliation for ostracism. This finding suggests that regulation of emotions in the self can function as an inhibitor of inappropriate emotional behaviors in interpersonal situations.